Perez Broke Record For Fund-raising

In his final campaign push for contributions, Eddie A. Perez surpassed the $200,000 threshold by once again tapping a network of out-of-town donors, according to the latest campaign finance documents.

Perez collected a record-breaking $219,647 over his successful five-month campaign to become Hartford's mayor against four petitioning candidates and one Libertarian candidate who, based on fund-raising numbers, barely threatened his front-runner status.

But Perez campaign workers said they needed a large pot of money to get out their message against the challengers, who Perez workers say had support in the community. In the end, Perez walked away with 75 percent of the vote on Election Day -- a victory that cost about $25 a vote.

The campaign will have spent all but about $6,000 once the remaining bills are paid, said Andrew Sullivan, the deputy campaign treasurer.

The fund-raising total squashes the $131,000 record set by former Mayor Michael P. Peters two years ago.

``It was justified because there were people who had more name recognition [than Perez],'' said Andrea Comer, a campaign aide and spokesman for Perez, who was not available for comment.

She mentioned Robert F. Ludgin, an attorney and a former deputy mayor, and the Rev. Nora Wyatt Jr., ``who seemed to have very strong grassroots community support.''

``I don't think any one of us expected to win by the margin that we did,'' Comer said.

From Oct. 29 to Dec. 20, the latest reporting period, Perez brought in $27,000 from political action committees and individuals, including developers, school district employees, Hartford restaurant owners and other firms with business interests before city hall.

Arthur Anderson, a housing consultant and Peters confidant, contributed $1,000. Two executives of Tomasso Bros. Inc., the construction firm, donated $500 each. And two employees of American Medical Response Inc., the city's ambulance provider, which found itself under scrutiny earlier this year when it took 13 minutes to respond to a shooting victim, each contributed $50.

Ludgin, who estimates that he used $40,000 of his own money to run his campaign, once again took aim at Perez for accepting money from people who live outside the city or work for firms that do business with city hall.

About 70 percent of the individual contributors listed on Perez's campaign finance documents had out-of-town addresses.

``When you get into office, who do you represent?'' Ludgin asked. Other than those who voted for Perez, Ludgin said, ``he also represents the people who made these contributions.''

Comer said some of Perez's contributors may live outside Hartford, but they also work in the city and are interested in supporting it.

``You don't necessarily have to have a Hartford ZIP code to care about Hartford,'' Comer said. ``I think it would be hard for people to say Eddie is beholden to anyone. He would be stretched a little thin.''

Some of the largest expenditures were for campaign literature. In the last week of the campaign, about $9,100 was paid to Winning Directions, a San Francisco direct-mail consultant. Winning Directions was paid another $16,891 earlier in the campaign.

Perez also contributed $20,000 to the Democratic town committee. And similar to the effort during the primary, Perez paid $2,200 for campaign workers to drive voters to the polls and distribute literature on Election Day.

Also on Friday, three candidates in the November election paid $55 fines to the city for failing to file their campaign finance forms on time. Councilman John Kennelly, Treasurer Kathleen Palm and Wyatt missed the Dec. 21 deadline and handed in their documents late this week.

Republican council candidate Michael J. Lupo had still not filed his forms as of late Friday afternoon, said City Clerk Daniel Carey.